Recompence
by Blue's October
Summary: When a serial killer's signature reappears after twelve years, Olivia and Elliot look for clues in his last known murder and uncover a mysterious street kid, who is his only surviving victim.
1. Chapter 1

SVU: Episode "Recompence"

 ** _November 30_** ** _th_** ** _, 1998_**

The night was still. Quiet. Dark. In the mere morning hours of that November morning, not a creature nor person stirred as the Meyers household slept within their old century brownstone. The only sound noticeable was the hush hush wind of winterous air swirling outside their frosted windows.

Darren and Gisele were in the master, snuggled tightly in one another's arms, while their four children slept down the hall. Emma and Jenny, the twins, slept in their cotton candy colored room, their unicorn nightlight glowing just beneath their single bedroom window. Their brother, Noah, slept in the next room. He slept in his Star Wars onesie pajamas as he tossed and turned every minute or so, engulfing himself in a ball of blankets by the time he returned back to a peaceful slumber.

And little Hayley, slept in the room across from her sisters and on the right of her brother. She was the oldest sister. At 8 years old, she was two years older than Jenny and Emma, and three years older than Noah. She was the big sister. The first born. The sound sleeper.

Until she heard a loud bang in the next room.

Her blue eyes shot open as she heard footsteps pound down the hallway. Like boots. Boots banging against the hardwood floor that filled the brownstone from top to bottom. Echoes of the clunky boots filling Hayley's ears even though she clasped her hands down against them to block them out. She could hear her mother, crying from down the hallway. A blood curdling cry shot in her ears and the young girl was petrified as she soiled herself in her flannel pajamas. She started to whimper. She was terrified of what was taking place only a few feet away from her.

She gathered up her bravery and reached for the handle to her bedroom door. She peeked out and saw her mother crawling on the floor, blood seeping out of her chest as she scrambled for the door. Her eyes were wide open, her breath trembling as she tried to fight her way to her children.

But a shadowy figure came behind her and she wailed out in terror as the figure shot a bullet through her head. Hayley gasped as her mother's blood splattered against the walls and she instantly closed her door and hid beneath her bed.

The footsteps came closer and closer and she could hear him enter her sisters' room. Emma and Jenny squealed and squealed as the figure's footsteps came closer and quiet came over again as he silenced them with four bullets each. The pop that gun made jolted Hayley and before she knew it, tears seeped down her cheeks as she heard it pop three times in her brother's room. She clasped her mouth to prevent her cries from being heard.

Her door swung open last and the dark figure entered. Hayley could only see his leather boots from under her bed. She watched him circle her bed, one foot by one foot, so slowly she began to tense with agonizing anticipation of her violent demise. She began to slowly slide across the floor, towards her door as he made his way to the other side of her bed. She was out from under it, her stomach still pressed against the floor as she watched him lift the comforter from under her bed. His shadow filling up the floor beneath it.

In a flash, she was gone and she darted for the stairs, running down as fast as she could into the snow outside her front door. She kept running and running, breathless as she sliced her feet against the pavement of the New York City Streets. She was cold, tired, and most of all, petrified. The image of the man killing her mother and the loud bang of his gun swirled in her head as she cried down the streets.

She only stopped when she crashed into a gentleman eight blocks away. She ran right into him and he caught her, putting his hands on her shoulder to stop her from running away further. She squirmed in his grasp, terrified it was the man who killed her family. She began to hyperventilate at the thought, her eyes bloodshot with horror as it flashed through her mind.

"Whoa, whoa. Miss. What are you doing in the middle of the streets at this time of night?"

"He killed my family! He killed my family!" She sobbed frightfully as she wrapped her arms around herself before the man took her in his. He was stunned, unsure of what to say. What to do. So he called the cops and before she knew it, the nightmare was beginning. Her family's murder was becoming real.

SVU Opening and Theme


	2. Chapter 2

"What happened?" Olivia asked as she and Elliot walked up to a commotion brewing in a Midtown alley. Crime scene tape, patrol cars and crowds surrounding the scene. They knew it had to be a homicide.

Cragen let them know the basics when he got the call, but they were unprepared for the gory scene before them. A female victim. Long curly red hair, porcelain white skin, and freckles along her cheeks. Only eight years old.

"Little girl. Found by a jogger earlier this morning. She was raped, tortured, and then asphyxiated. We found her backpack in the garbage can beside her." A crime scene investigator said as he led them to her body.

Elliot squinted as he tried to stomach the sight of her body. She had a butterfly barrette in her hair, just like his daughter Kathleen wore when she was that age. He couldn't help but think of her and what he would do to the person responsible if that truly was her.

"Was she on her way to school when the perp grabbed her?" Elliot asked.

"Not sure. No I.D. or anything to identify her with."

"How do you know it was her backpack then?" Olivia asked.

"There was blood on it. I'll have the M.E. take a look at it."

Olivia thanked him with a nod and turned to her partner, watching the media circus at the border of the tape.

"All alone. Murdered and no one knows who she is."

"Someone has to…" He said, hearing a hysterical voice from behind the crowds. It sounded like a women crying.

A woman emerged from the crowd as she darted for the alley, stopping in her tracks as Elliot held her back.

"Whoa, ma'am you can't be back here. This is a crime scene." He said.

"Is that my daughter? Is that Molly? Oh please dear God, please tell me she's ok."

"Ma'am, can you tell me your name?" Olivia asked.

"Sara Brunswick. My daughter, Molly," she said as she reached into her wallet and took out a school photo. "She was supposed to be with her Dad last night, but he just told me she wasn't with him and I started to panic. But I heard there was a girl found in the alley. Is that my baby?" She continued, sobbing uncontrollably.

Olivia looked at the photo and realized it was her - Jane Doe was Molly Brunswick. She wished for once this was still an open case and her mother didn't have to see her daughter like this.

"Mrs. Brunswick, let's go back to the precinct…" Olivia urged.

"Not until I see her, Molly," She pushed passed Elliot and stopped when she saw her daughter, dead on the floor of the alley. She closed her eyes and kneeled, sobbing at the top of her lungs. Elliot caught her from behind in his arms and stood there frozen, feeling her grief inside her body, not sure what to say in that moment. Olivia was upset as well, seeing this woman so heartbroken over her loss. She put her hand on Sara's shoulder and led her away with Elliot from the scene, just in time for a sheet to be placed over daughter's body. Away from the flashing lights.

Olivia placed the coffee mug in front of Sara as she sat solemnly at the table of the conference room with Elliot by her side. Olivia took a seat as well, leaning forward to offer the grieving mother some comfort.

"I'm so sorry for your loss, Mrs. Brunswick. You shouldn't have seen that."

"I had to see it though. To know what happened to her. Not to wonder for decades what ever happened to my little girl." She said, calmly as she took a sip of the coffee.

"Mrs. Brunswick, you said Molly was supposed to be at her father's house last night. I assume you two are divorced?" Elliot asked.

"No. Not at all. He's a neurosurgeon at Mercy General. He was offered this position at the National Institutes of Health. Contract for a year. I sent Molly there to visit him. He misses her so much, and I wanted to give her some time with her Dad."

"That's tough, having a long-distance marriage." Olivia noted.

"It is, but he deserves it. He was a stay-at-home dad with Molly right after she was born. He was my rock when she was in the hospital with leukemia. He had to give up so many opportunities in the past for Molly's sake, but I encouraged him to go so he could get back to the job he loved."

"Were you not going with her to visit her Dad?" Elliot asked.

"I was, but not that day. I asked the nanny to take her to Penn Station and put her on the train so her Dad would pick her up right in D.C. I was going to come today because I had a very important meeting that I couldn't reschedule." Sara said.

"And what is the name of this nanny?" Olivia asked, pulling a notepad and pen in front of her.

"Ingrid. Ingrid Lennox. I called her a hundred times but she hasn't returned my calls."

"Ok, when was the last time you spoke with her?"

"Yesterday afternoon. She called me to tell me she was at Penn Station with Molly. 1:35 train to D.C."

A call from the lobby startled Elliot and Olivia. "Sara, Sara!" A man's voice called.

"That's my husband, Jonathan."

Sara darted out the door and called for her husband. "Jonathan!"

He sighed in relieve and caught her in his arms as she hugged him tightly. He began to sob as she whispered that Molly was gone. Olivia and Elliot watched them, looking at each other with sadness over this tragedy.

Munch and Finn were in the squad room, looking over the footage from Penn Station for the day Molly disappeared. They scrolled through until he reached the 1:00 hour of footage. Olivia and Elliot came out after asking the Brunswick's more questions before sending them home with their condolences.

"Please tell me you have something to find the son of a bitch responsible for this?" Olivia said as she walked up to the monitor.

"Not yet. I see Ingrid and Molly at the entrance to terminal 12 at one thirty…" Munch replied.

"And that's the backpack they found in the garbage next to Molly's body in the alley." Elliot noted as he pointed at the upper right monitor.

"Right before the train takes off, Ingrid goes to the left where the bathrooms are. Out of the view of the cameras. And Molly stands at the entrance to the terminal. Ten minutes later, Molly walks off with a man. But you can't see his face because he has a hood over his face." Finn noted.

"She doesn't seem afraid of him, almost like he's someone she knows." Olivia said.

"And then she just goes off with him." Elliot noted. "No sight of Molly or the guy she walked off with afterwards."

"But where is Ingrid? She doesn't make an appearance even after another fifteen minutes." Munch said as he fast forwarded through the rest of the tapes.

"Maybe there was a line to the bathroom." Finn said.

"And leave the child alone for that long? Missing the train? No way." Olivia asked.

"So why did she leave with him?"

"I don't know, but we need to find that nanny. See if anyone was watching Molly in the train station." Elliot said as he and Liv walked to their desks to grab their stuff and go.

"Hold on a minute." Cragen called as Elliot grabbed his jacket off the chair. "We may have found her."

"Where?" Olivia asked.

"Penn Station. Women's restroom. Strangled to death." He said.

Olivia and Elliot were frozen in their tracks.

The detectives marched on to the scene as more tape and more people surrounded the women's restroom where Ingrid's body was found.

"Her body was in the restroom and no one noticed it?" Elliot asked as he motioned to the manager as he turned to face them.

"It was blocked off. There was an out of order sign on the door and maintenance doesn't come till this morning. Poor guy got quite a fright when he walked in to check the bathroom." The man said as he strolled with the detectives inside.

There on the floor with her neck tied to the stall with a tie was Ingrid. Dirty blonde hair and thick rectangle glasses, dressed in a beige turtleneck and a plaid pencil skirt. She was only twenty eight. Her skirt was pushed up to her thighs and her underwear was missing. She was definitely raped.

"Dead for at least 36 hours." Melinda remarked as she rose to greet Olivia and Elliot. Clipboard in hand and blue M.E. jacket on her shoulders, she was ready to work. "No sign of fluids inside the victim, but anal tearing and a hickey on her neck."

"Any saliva from the perp?" Elliot asked.

"Nope. Cleaned off with neutral cleaner." She replied.

"This is one smart perp." He said. "So she gets attacked in the bathroom and the perp leads Molly away and kidnaps and kills her?"

"It's not far off. I mean maybe he killed Ingrid to get to Molly and makes a getaway with the girl." Olivia said.

"And we have no idea who he is. Perfect."


End file.
